Ed Markey

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, today I recognize Frank Moroney, executive director of AFSCME Council 93 and the AFSCME International vice president for the northern New England region. For his entire life, Frank has been a committed and fearless advocate for working people. Now, after four decades of service, he is entering a well- deserved retirement. Frank began his career with AFSCME in 1967, when he joined Local 1358 as a worker in the Brookline Water Department. He quickly rose through the union ranks, and in 1971, he was elected president of the local. Frank scored two huge victories for his members early in his career. In 1973, he successfully took his local on strike and received important longevity benefits for its members. He then fought for survivor health insurance benefits for all Brookline's municipal employees, taking the fight to the voters and winning on a ballot initiative. Frank would build on these achievements as his career progressed, improving the lives of thousands of public employees throughout New England. He secured numerous wage increases, obtained more paid sick leave time, and successfully negotiated the Agency Fee in Maine. In 2012, Frank was appointed as the executive director of Council 93 and as vice president to the AFSCME International Executive Board, where he has served since. It is a leadership position befiting his service and dedication. On April 1, 2019, Frank will retire as AFSCME Council 93 executive director. Throughout my and Frank's years of service, I have had the privilege of working closely with him and am lucky enough to call him my friend. Frank is irreplaceable, but his successes have left the council strong and one of the most effective AFSCME affiliates in the Nation.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President.

Mr. MARKEY. Will the Senator yield for a second?

Mr. MARKEY. I would just seek to be recognized and just ask the Senator if the--

Mr. MARKEY.--$93 trillion number comes from a Koch brothers-funded organization.

Mr. MARKEY. Would the Senator yield and tell us--

Mr. MARKEY. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. MARKEY. Would the Senator from Alaska yield for a question?

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the Presiding Officer. Mr. President, I would pose a question to the Senator from Alaska.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, through the Presiding Officer, I pose a question to the Senator from Alaska.

Mr. MARKEY. I thank the Presiding Officer. I will just make this point through the Presiding Officer, which is that the words ``fossil fuels'' are not in the resolution. No. 2, airplanes are not banned in the resolution. No. 3, there is no guarantee for healthcare for everyone in America in the resolution. No. 4, there is nothing that provides for those who are unwilling to work in the resolution. None of this is true. We know the Koch brothers paid for this $93 trillion study, and all we are hearing from the Republican side is of a Koch brothers-produced document that is absolutely inaccurate. There is no banning of airplanes. There is no guarantee of Medicare for all. Neither of those is in the resolution. This entire discussion is based upon a completely fraudulent, bogus report that the Koch brothers produced. What we are trying to say to the other side is we should have a debate about the science, that we should have a debate about the human activity, that we should have a debate about what the solutions are, and that we should bring it out here as a great deliberative body. Right now, we are debating the Green New Deal, but the Republicans haven't given us any hearings. They have given us no scientists, no witnesses, and no debate. They are just doing this because the Koch brothers have produced a report at a cost of $93 trillion that is completely and totally inaccurate. In fact, with regard to the accusation of the banning of airplanes, PolitiFact has looked at it, examined it, and said it is completely and totally inaccurate. I think it is difficult to have a debate when the facts here are those which we cannot submit to committees, witnesses, debates. Instead, all we are subjected to is a representation of the Green New Deal that is completely inaccurate. For that matter, the words ``fossil fuels'' don't even appear in the Green New Deal. This is not right. If the Republicans want to, they should set up a debate. Then we could have it out here on whether the planet is dangerously warming, whether human activity is principally responsible, whether this body should take action in order to deal with that problem, and whether, economically, we can unleash a technological revolution to solve the problem. That is what we should be debating out here this afternoon, not a whole group of bogus facts that have been produced by the Koch brothers, have been paid for by the Koch brothers, and that are being repeated over and over again on the other side without any Republican saying he actually believes the planet is dangerously warming, that he actually agrees with the U.N.'s scientists who say it is an existential threat to us, that he actually agrees it is largely caused by human activity, and that we, the greatest deliberative body in the world, should have a robust debate. If the Republicans believe it is serious, they should present their own plan for debate on the Senate floor.

Mr. MARKEY. I yield to the leader.

Mr. MARKEY. I yield to the leader for a question.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, the leader has put his finger right on it. We want a debate. We want to see their plan. We want to know if they agree with the science of the entire United Nations and 13 of our own Federal Agencies that produced an identical report at the end of 2018-- that being, it is dangerous and a great threat to our country, and we have to do something about it. So where is the Republicans' plan? What is their answer? Of course, they don't have one. They want to bring out the Green New Deal with no hearings, no witnesses, and no science when they should be bringing out their own plan. The leader is right. It is just, basically, a condition they have, and the number they are using--the $93 trillion in terms of the cost of the Green New Deal--is a Koch brothers-produced number. It is their group that put it together. So how could we possibly be having a serious debate about something the Koch brothers have produced, in terms of dealing with global warming, since they are central players in this dangerous warming of our planet? I yield to the leader.

Mr. MARKEY. The leader is correct. No solutions, 5 years, and it is more dangerously warm on the planet. Four hundred billion dollars' worth of damage was done to our country in the last 2 years. We had fires out in the West, flooding, $400 billion worth of damage--and the consensus among scientists is that it is only going to grow worse as each year goes by--and still no answers. Nothing on the floor from the Republicans, nothing that would deal with the problem, and no admission that it is caused by human beings and that we can do something about it.

Mr. MARKEY. We don't know the answer.

Mr. MARKEY. We don't know the answer.

Mr. MARKEY. We don't know the answer.

Mr. MARKEY. And I would be glad to yield the floor to any of them who would be willing to be recognized, but, through the leader, the problem is that they keep talking about a $93 trillion cost, which is a report from the American Action Forum, a partisan, rightwing group funded by the Koch Brothers and Karl Rove as a sister group to his Crossroads USA 501(c)(3). That is what we are now debating out here on the floor, and not the science.

Mr. MARKEY. I would yield to any of my friends on the other side of the aisle who have concrete, positive proposals for dealing with the crisis of climate change in our country and on the planet.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I rise in defense of the internet. This is a fight for innovation, for entrepreneurialism, for the American economy, a fight for free speech--the cornerstone of our democracy--a fight for the most powerful platform for commerce and communications in the history of the planet. This is a fight for net neutrality. Today nearly every Member of the Senate Democratic caucus introduced a bill, the Save the Internet Act, to put net neutrality rules back on the books. Congressman Mike Doyle is leading the same effort over in the House. In the Senate, we have already successfully passed the proposal. The newly introduced Save the Internet Act and the Congressional Review Act we approved last Congress will have the same effect--overturning the Trump administration's FCC's wrongheaded decision and restoring the open internet order. Last May, in a historic, bipartisan CRA vote of 52 to 47, in the Senate on this floor, we sent a message to President Trump about what a free and open internet means, free of corporate control, open to all who want to communicate, engage, and innovate. We made clear this Congress will not fall for President Trump's special interest agenda and his broadband baron allies. This bill does what the American people want. It restores the rules so people are not subject to higher prices, slower internet speeds, and even blocked websites because the big broadband providers want to pump up their profits. With this bill, we will do right by the people who sent us here and fight to protect the internet as we know it. This is a fight which we can win. There is tremendous power on this issue. Republicans and Democrats alike agree we need net neutrality so the sky is the limit. Support for our position will only continue to grow. The critics claim the sky hasn't fallen since the FCC repeal, so why do we need net neutrality at all? The answer is simple. There is pending litigation right now in the DC Circuit Court challenging the FCC's repeal. So there is every reason in the world why they would not change their practices until the legal matter is settled in court. Any prudent business would act cautiously when there is an issue pending before a court, but once the issue is resolved in court, there are no rules. They can do what they want. In fact, I attended the court hearing and listened to 5 hours of oral argument. I saw firsthand how the FCC and broadband industry used tortured logic to defend the repeal of net neutrality and reclassification of broadband. I also organized an amicus brief with 100 other Members of the Senate and House in defense of the net neutrality rules. I am confident we will prevail in court. Net neutrality is just another way of saying nondiscrimination, just another way of saying big companies can't discriminate against small companies; that big companies can't discriminate against small individuals; that they have equal access to the internet. They don't have to pay extra to gain access. Net neutrality means nondiscrimination. Those are the rules we need for the internet in order to see explosive economic growth because of the new ideas that are able to be introduced and at the same time so democracy can flourish because every voice is treated equally on the internet. So whether it is in the Halls of Congress or in the courts, we will not stop fighting until net neutrality is fully restored. We are on the right side of history, and we will not give up this fight until we have won. I thank you for the time. At this point, I yield the floor.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I thank the gentleman from New Mexico for his comments. I couldn't agree more wholeheartedly with the sentiments that the gentleman from New Mexico just uttered and the others, the Senator from Rhode Island and the Senator from New York. This is an emergency situation for the planet. How do we know? We know because the U.N. scientists at the end of 2018 issued a report saying that climate change is an existential threat to our planet. Our own U.S. scientists in the end of 2018 issued their own report. This is the Trump administration's scientists, much to his chagrin, who said: ``We must act to avoid substantial damages to the U.S. economy, environment, and human health and the well-being over the coming decades.'' These are earth-shattering science reports about the state of our planet. These are doomsday reports, which the scientists of our own country and the world are giving to us. Yet just 3 weeks ago, the ``Denier in Chief'' stood before the Congress and delivered a message to the American people--not by his words but by the words he did not utter, because in an hour and 20 minutes, President Trump did not even mention the words ``climate change.'' He did not even mention the words ``clean energy revolution.'' President Trump, further, has sent to us a new person to be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Who is Andrew Wheeler? He is a former lobbyist for the coal industry. That is what this Senate will be voting on--a coal lobbyist to take over the environment of our country, as the scientists of our country tell us that we are facing an existential threat if we do not take urgent actions today. Our majority leader yesterday called the Green New Deal ``foolish and dangerous.'' Well, with all due respect to my Republican colleagues, the only thing foolish and dangerous about the Green New Deal is to ignore the $400 billion in damages over the last 2 years from supercharged storms and wildfires, to ignore the tens of trillions of dollars in the damage that we will see from climate change in the United States by 2100 if we do not act, and the hundreds of trillions of damage across the entire planet if we are not the leader in creating a clean-energy revolution. What is dangerous, I say to the leader, is sending our men and women in the military overseas to protect tankers of oil that are coming into our country from the Middle East. Superstorms, wildfires, rising seas, and other extreme weather events are the impacts of climate change if we do not act boldly to stop it. It isn't just dangerous; it is an existential threat to our planet, not from politicians or political scientists but from real scientists--``the'' scientists--the Nobel Prize-winning scientists of the whole planet and in our own country. They are telling us we are in danger, and this body has to take positive action to deal with it. We have a ``Denier in Chief'' in the White House. We have a Republican leader who has brought climate bills to the floor while he has been leader, but they have been bills to make the climate even more dangerous--the Keystone Pipeline bill and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil. The Republicans are today going to confirm a coal lobbyist to head the Environmental Protection Agency, which is the Agency charged with protecting the planet. The reality is that the Republicans have no plan to deal with the climate crisis. That is why they want to short circuit this debate on the Green New Deal. Let's have a hearing. Let's hear from experts. Let's hear from scientists. Let's have the evidence in the U.S. Senate. Then we can decide--but, no, there will be no debate in the Senate on science. There will be no debate on the harm that is going to be done if we do not act. Instead, in the same period, there will be just an attempt to confirm a coal lobbyist to take over the Environmental Protection Agency and to derail any real debate on the Green New Deal. That is who they are. Why is that? It is that the Green New Deal is dangerous. It is dangerous for the status quo to just continue to remain in place on climate change. It is dangerous for the Koch brothers and those who are used to killing every climate debate before it gets a chance to start. It is dangerous for those who want us to limp into a frightening future with no plan and no protections in place. It is dangerous for those who benefit from the continued devaluation of our workers, from the historic oppression of vulnerable communities, and from the continued destruction of the environment. That is who would think the Green New Deal is dangerous. The Democrats want to support working families and support a safe climate future in which all communities are protected. We welcome debate on proposals for how to get there, but the science is clear on what we need to do and the magnitude of the response that we have to unleash in this country. The Republicans may think the Green New Deal is just a resolution, but it is more than that. It is a revolution, and it cannot and will not be stopped. The science is driving this. It is an intergenerational concern that we are heading toward a catastrophe on this planet that could have been avoided, but we as a nation have stood on the sidelines and have allowed it to happen. Ladies and gentlemen, this vote that we take as to whether Andrew Wheeler, a coal lobbyist, should be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency goes right through the heart of whether we are going to respond to the magnitude of this challenge. I do not know how anyone can vote for Andrew Wheeler given the science that has been presented to us, given the danger that we now know, given the catastrophe that is going to be created if we don't change course. This is just doubling down on a disaster. Andrew Wheeler is going to be the architect of the Republican plan to ensure that we do nothing about this climate catastrophe. The consequences could not be greater, but the political ramifications in the 2020 elections are going to be great as well. We will see a revolution that rises up across this country. I yield the floor.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. President, I am here today to talk about climate change and about our climate crisis. Climate change is an existential threat to our country and the planet. We know this because the world's leading scientists--the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change--just made that very warning last year. The U.N. report told us that we have very limited time until we are past the point of no return and the most catastrophic impacts of climate change are irreversible. Our own Federal scientists across 13 Agencies also just warned in the ``National Climate Assessment'' that the impacts of climate change are not in the future but are happening in our communities right now. Here is what all 13 Federal Agencies said: ``Our efforts do not yet approach the scale necessary to avoid substantial damages to the economy, environment, and human health.'' These are Earth-shattering reports about the state of our Earth. These are the doomsday reports about what will happen if we do not take bold action. The consequences of climate change will be dire: a tenfold increase in ice-free summers in the Arctic, a 99-percent loss of coral reefs, and a doubling of species lost around the world. In worst-case scenarios in the Northeast, by the end of the century, both the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Logan Airport will be underwater. Climate emissions are not slowing down. In 2018, greenhouse gas emissions in the United States increased by 2.8 percent. We have a denier-in-chief in the White House. This week, Republicans in the Senate are poised to confirm a coal lobbyist to be the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. It is unbelievable that we will confirm a coal lobbyist to be the head of our environment in our country. Andrew Wheeler's denial of the climate crisis should in and of itself be disqualifying. His record as a coal lobbyist should be disqualifying. We should come together and reject Andrew Wheeler as the next head of the Environmental Protection Agency. The impact of climate change on ordinary families, on their health, on our Nation, on our security, and on our future is too urgent. The United Nations tells us that climate change is an existential threat to the planet. It is the national security, health, economic, and moral issue of our time--of all time. We have a responsibility to act. We must be bold. We must be ambitious. That is why I have introduced the Green New Deal resolution, because it lays out a serious, bold, and aspirational set of goals that meet the scale of the threat. It is a set of principles and not prescriptions. It challenges this country to find solutions to this problem. The Green New Deal is a climate plan about net-zero emissions. The Republican climate plan is in zero existence. They don't have a climate plan. Republicans don't like the Green New Deal because they don't like a functional government. Republicans don't like the Green New Deal because they don't like climate science. Republicans don't like the Green New Deal because their allies--the oil companies, the coal companies, and the corporate polluters--don't like wind power or solar power or all-electric vehicles or the millions of blue-collar jobs they can create. We can save all of creation by engaging in massive blue- collar job creation in this country. Republicans don't like the Green New Deal because clean energy is a direct threat to the interests and the bottom line of Big Oil and King Coal. The Green New Deal isn't just a socialist manifesto. It isn't pie in the sky. It isn't a takeover. It isn't any of the misinformation and distortions that Republicans and their fossil fuel allies have called it. The Green New Deal isn't, as the Republican leader called it this morning, ``the far left's Santa Claus wish list dressed up to look like serious policy.'' If it were, then Republicans in this Chamber wouldn't care enough about it to spend their entire morning remarks on it, and the majority leader wouldn't be threatening to bring it to the floor without any hearings, without any expert testimony, without any amendments, and without any science. Let's have the debate. Let's have the hearings. Let's bring in all the experts. Let's let the U.N. testify. Let's let our own scientists and every one of the Federal Agencies in America testify. Let's bring in all of the corporate executives right now on wind, solar, all- electric vehicles, and storage batteries in our society. Bring them in. Let's hear the stories. Instead, what we have is just an attempt to short-circuit the debate. They may not believe climate change is an existential threat to human kind, but they are smart enough to know that the bold goals of the Green New Deal are an existential threat to the Koch brothers and all of their other corporate polluter and fossil fuel allies. Let me just read some of what is in the Green New Deal that Republicans are opposed to: securing for all people of the United States for generations to come clean air and water, climate and community resiliency, healthy food, access to nature, and a sustainable environment. Are Republicans opposed to access to nature? That is in the resolution. Are Republicans opposed to clean air and water? That is in the resolution too. Do you know what is not in the resolution? Ending airline travel. Do you know what is not in the resolution? No more cows. Do you know what is not in the resolution? A prohibition on nuclear energy or carbon capture and sequestration. The Green New Deal resolution is bold, and it is aspirational in its principles, but it is not prescriptive in its policies. Let's look at some of what is actually in this resolution: to create millions of good, high-wage jobs--I guess Republicans don't believe in that; to invest in the infrastructure and industry of the United States to sustainably meet the challenge of the 21st century--I guess Republicans don't believe in that; guaranteeing universal access to clean water, supporting family farming, cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites, ensuring economic development and sustainability on those sites--I guess Republicans don't believe in those either. Those are all part of the Green New Deal and climate solutions. We already know that Big Oil and King Coal and other fossil fuel companies don't want to compete with clean energy because that is a direct threat to their business plan. Clean energy makes the air we breathe cleaner, it saves consumers money, it makes us safer, and it creates jobs. In his remarks, the Republican leader called the Green New Deal ``foolish and dangerous.'' With all due respect to the leader and my Republican colleagues, the only foolish and dangerous thing about the Green New Deal is to ignore the $400 billion in damage to our country over the last 2 years from supercharged storms and wildfires all over California and all over the West. To ignore the tens of trillions of dollars in damages we will see from climate change in the United States by 2100 is something that ultimately, from my perspective, is foolish and dangerous. An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure. Ignoring what is happening, ignoring the warnings from all of the top scientists in the world and in the United States and continuing on the same pathway--that is foolish, that is dangerous, and that is going to cost us tens of trillions of dollars in damages that would have been otherwise avoided if we unleashed a technology revolution in our country that would create millions of new jobs. It is also dangerous to send our men and women in the military overseas to protect tankers of oil coming from the Middle East to the United States. We are still bringing in oil from Saudi Arabia. We are still bringing in oil from other countries in the Middle East. What if we could dramatically increase the fuel economy in the vehicles we drive? What if we could accelerate the pace to use all-electric vehicles? Wouldn't it be great if we could say that the day arrived when we never have to see another tanker of oil from the Middle East coming into our country? Would that not make us safer? Would that not give us better control of our own foreign policy and where we send young men and women in uniform? I think it would. I think it would be foolish and dangerous not to take that pathway. The superstorms, the wildfires, the rising seas, and the other extreme weather events--the impacts of climate change if we do not act boldly to stop it--that isn't just dangerous; that is an existential threat. That is what the world's scientists have called it. The Green New Deal is dangerous for the status quo of doing nothing on climate change. It is dangerous for the Koch brothers and those who are used to killing off every climate debate before it gets a chance to start. It is dangerous for those who want us to limp into a frightening future with no plan and no protections in place. It is dangerous for those who benefit from the continued devaluation of our workers, the historic oppression of vulnerable communities, and from the continued destruction of the environment. Those are the ones who would think the Green New Deal is dangerous. We want to support working families and support a safe climate future where all communities are protected. We welcome a debate on proposals for how to get there, but the science is clear as to where we need to end up. The Republicans may think that the Green New Deal is just a resolution, but it is a revolution. It is a revolution. Young people want a green energy revolution in our country. They know we can do this. They know that all of these new technologies can be invented; all of these new technologies can be deployed. It is not just a resolution; it is a revolution. All across this country, when the Republicans have refused to bring their climate plan out there because theirs is a party of science denial--the President is the ``Denier in Chief'' on climate science--then we are going to allow this problem to worsen and worsen and worsen. Do you know who should know best? Donald Trump, because within 30 years, according to the science, Mar-a-Lago is going to become Mar-a- Lagoon. It is right on the coast. It has already begun to happen. It is just going to continue. The President might be able to protect his property, but we are going to lose tens of trillions of dollars for the properties of other Americans because he decided that he was going to deny the warning that the scientists have presented to us. When I was a boy, lying on the rug, looking at President Kennedy on the television, he challenged our country to send a mission to the Moon and to return that mission safely to the United States within 10 years. When he gave that speech at Rice University, he made very clear in the speech that we would have to invent new metal alloys that did not exist. We would have to invent new transmission systems that did not exist, that we would have to return that mission safely from the Moon through heat half the intensity of the Sun. We would have to complete it within 10 years, and we would have to do it not because it was easy but because it was hard. We had to be bold. Because the challenge from the Soviet Union was so great, the United States did not have an option. Failure was not an option, and we completed that mission. Well, the same thing is true here for a Green New Deal. Failure is not an option. The consequences will be catastrophic for our planet and for the United States of America, and the solution is to unleash this green energy job-creation engine. We now have 350,000 solar and wind workers in the United States. It is up from almost nothing in 2008. It has already happened over 10 years. We had only 1,000 megawatts of solar in our country in 2008. We now have 62,000 megawatts of solar. We had only 25,000 megawatts of wind. We now have 98,000 megawatts of wind. We had only 2,000 all-electric vehicles in our country in 2008. We now have a million, and between Tesla and all of the other companies, they are going to sell 500,000 just this year in our country. They have invented new metals. They have invented new battery systems. They have invented new propulsion systems in order to solve those problems, but we still have a long way to go. It is imperative that we put the tax breaks for wind and solar, for all electric vehicles, for batteries on the books and make them permanent because this problem is going to be solved only if we can convince the smartest young people in our country that all of the incentives, all of the policies are there and that their country has their back and wants them to solve the problem in the same way that our whole country had the back of NASA in the 1960s. If we do that, we will be successful. There is no question about it in my mind. I am a technological optimist, and I hate the pessimism of the other side. I hate this ``can't do'' mentality that they have, especially given what has happened in the last 10 years in electric vehicles and wind, solar, and storage technology breakthroughs. It is just really sad to hear this. I think, ultimately, something is rising up across this country. Young people, especially, know it is time for the revolution. They know it is time to close the door on this era where all we do is indiscriminately use the atmosphere as a sewer for all of this carbon and all of these greenhouse gases. I am very confident that one way or another this body will start to act or it is going to become one of the top two or three election issues in 2020 because this generation knows that the planet is running a fever. There are no emergency rooms on planets, and it is going to take action in this body in order to put the policies in place, in order to preserve this planet and hand it on better than we found it. The challenge is great. The Green New Deal sets the framework for laying out how serious the problem is and how bold the action has to be to deal with that serious problem for our planet. If we do it right, I think future generations will look back on ours in the same way we now look back on President Kennedy and that generation, and they will know that they discharged their historic responsibility to our country and to the planet. With that, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.